I like what I'm seeing from Akiko so far. I love the music she picked and I'm sure once she's in full-on perform mode it's going to be great. Her jumps look really strong! But then again she's always been a strong early season skater.

Liza T's program (from the little bit she actually performed) looks like a waste of Malaguena. The choreography looks a little boring and unimaginative. I have yet to see a senior lady pull that music off convincingly in a FS. Of course Sasha is the gatekeeper when it comes to the SP but no one has done it justice for 4 minutes...

Ironically, trying to minimise confusion to people who are not living in Europe is precisely the reason I am being pedantic over time zones and Daylight Savings Time.

Let me explain.

There are four main times zones in Europe:

Greenwich Mean Time (GMT+0)
Cental European Time (GMT+1)
Eastern European Time (GMT+2)
Moscow Time (GMT+4)

Moscow Time used to be GMT+3. But, in 2011, Medvedev decided to move Russia permanently onto Daylight Savings Time. When Putin came back to the Presidency, he was going to change it back, but changed his mind.

Daylight Savings Time is the reason for the current confusion. From the last Sunday in March to last Sunday in October, all of Europe west of Russia observes Daylight Savings Time. So, the current time zones are:

British Summer Time (GMT+1)
Cental European Summer Time (GMT+2)
Eastern European Summer Time (GMT+3)
Moscow Time (GMT+4)

GMT is the universal standard for calculating time zones from.

For us in Europe, it is easy to convert the time for an event elsewhere in Europe. And as long as you know which time zone the country is in, it is easy to work out times compared to our own.

The problem is that most people across the globe know that GMT is used in Britain, Ireland and Portugal. But, a lot people outside Europe don't realise (or simply forget) that Britain, Ireland and Portugal move away from GMT for 7 months of the year.

This is a global forum. So, some people will be calculating from what they know is the time in GMT, while others will be calculating from what they know is the time in London.

So, to make everything clear to everybody, every time I talk about times, I am emphasising that Europe is in Daylight Savings Time so that people outside Europe don't end up missing parts of the competitions that are being held in Europe.

Don't worry, once we reach the last Sunday in October, everything will be simple again!

I LOVE this SD!! Much better than D/W for me (but we'll see, we know how D/W programs can improve a lot in the second half of the season...) But the stream stopped right before the twizzles so I didn't see them